SC dismisses petition seeking CBI probe, HC orders forensic tests

This comes at the time when Supreme Court on Friday dismissed a petition seeking CBI probe into the sting operation and asked petitioner to approach the High Court in this connection.

The Division Bench of the High Court led by Chief Justice Manjulla Chellur on Friday ordered that the forensic test of the video footages in Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL) in Hyderabad.

The three member committee that was formed to collect the video footage from Narada News will also go to Hyderabad to hand over the footages to the director of CFSL. The three member committee is comprised of Anil Kumar, IG of West Bengal Police Recruitment Cell, Nagendra Prasad, SP of CBI’s Anti Corruption Branch and Jayanta Kumar Kole, Registrar (original side) of the Calcutta High Court.

The committee members will hand over the pen drive containing the raw video footages and the mobile phone using which the video was shot.

The Court has also ordered the news agency to hand over the laptop that was used to download the video footages from the cell phone in which it was shot to CFSL for test.

As per the Court’s order, the forensic science laboratory has to give a report in this connection within four weeks. The report has to be submitted to the Court in a sealed envelope.

The members of the committee had maintained secrecy on collection and submission of the footages and devices. The team member went to Delhi and collected the footages keeping the date, time and place of collection secret.

The Court had earlier observed that it is very important to ascertain whether the video footages are genuine or not. It may be mentioned that the Court had also asked the news agency to submit an affidavit stating that the footages were genuine. The forensic test in the CFSL had become necessary to ascertain the genuinity of the footages. The main case will start after the report is submitted before the Court.

Last week, Mathew Samuel, editor of Narada News had admitted that while getting employment he did not tell his employer KD Singh, Trinamool Congress MP and owner of Tehelka that he had conducted a sting operation on his party colleagues nor could he say why he worked for him for two years.

Samuel did not have any answer when asked why he took two years to publish the sting operation and that too just ahead of the election in West Bengal. “My friends wanted the video to be published “was the reason given by him.

Samuel refused to divulge the names of those who had funded the money which he had given to the TMC leaders. “If High Court wants I will say before the Court the names of the financiers and they will reveal from where they had received the money. “ He said the money did not come from Dubai through Hawala transaction as claimed by TMC spokesperson, Derek O’ Brien. “It did not come from Dubai. It was given by my friends.”